Cobra Jet: The History of Ford's Greatest High-Performance Muscle Cars

CHAPTER ONE

1960–1966: FROM RACING BAN TO THE TOTAL PERFORMANCE YEARS

There is a reason many automotive enthusiasts and racing fans point to the 1960s as the glory days of cars and racing—the decade experienced an explosion in horsepower and speed not seen before or since. One of the quickest and most iconic street cars to come out of the muscle car era was the 428 Cobra Jet Mustang.

Yet before we get into 428 Cobra Jet history, we must look at what led to its creation.

(©MotorTrend Group. All rights reserved.)

Back to the 1940s

World War II made the 1940s a tumultuous time for American automakers. As the war came to a close and American GIs came home, they brought their fledgling passion for small European sports cars, as well as extensive knowledge of mechanics, since many had been thrust into the role of maintaining Jeeps, tanks, airplanes, and any other implements of war. Naturally, they began using their newfound talents and interests to modify indigenous American vehicles and thereby created one of the strongest and longest-enduring hobbies (for lack of a better term) of postwar America.

For many, this meant going back to their prewar hot rodding roots by hopping up the Model A and B Fords that they had left when they went off to war, only now with pockets full of money and all that mechanical knowledge. These men and women began racing on the dry lakes, the streets, and at a few scattered drag strips that had sprung up. The unfortunate result, especially from the view on the street, was the negative reaction toward the increased presence of hot rodders. Much like today’s connotation of street outlaws, hot rodders were perceived (rightly or wrongly) as a group of delinquent troublemakers with no regard to general public safety.

Across the country, dangerous (and sometimes fatal) street racing caught on, and with it the practice of gathering at local hangouts showing off their rides and cruising up and down local pikes at night. These activities became an easy target for public attention that focused increasingly on what was perceived as disconcerting national problems: juvenile delinquency and teenage gangs. As the popularity of hot rods (called gow jobs in the beginning) soared, hot rods and hot rodding, along with rock ‘n’ roll, became symbols for the darker side of American youth. A prime indicator of the hobby and its public image can be seen in any number of hot rod–related films from the 1950s; the characters were usually portrayed as hooligans and delinquents out to prey on the common folk.

SCTA: Sanctioned Racing

There needed to be some common ground in order for hot rodding to exist as a potentially positive thing in the general public’s eyes, and that’s where the Southern California Timing Association (SCTA, the sanctioning body that ran the dry lakes races at Muroc, El Mirage, and later, Bonneville) came in. In January 1948, the first Hot Rod Exhibition was put on by the SCTA at the National Guard Armory in Los Angeles in an attempt to validate hot rodders and their cars.

The emphasis was on the positive aspects of hot rodding, namely craftsmanship, engineering, and, most of all, safety. The SCTA also partnered with police officers (many of whom were hot rodders as well) and local governmental officials to lend an air of legitimacy, while former Hollywood publicist Robert E. Petersen created the program to the show, called it Hot Rod, and sold it on the steps outside the Armory.

So, the fuse was lit. Within two years, Hot Rod magazine’s circulation crossed the 300,000 mark, and the rest of the country had an insider’s look at what was happening on the West Coast, helping hot rodding spread across the country.

Racing Forced to Grow Up

Sadly, just as the hooligan label was starting to leave hot rodders, the racing world saw several brutal accidents with multiple fatalities. Perhaps the worst of them was at the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans, when Pierre Levegh crashed his Mercedes-Benz into the densely populated grandstands at 150 mph, resulting in a huge end-over-end fireball. Seventy-seven people were killed in the accident. As a result of this disaster, the French government responded to race safety by moving the spectators farther back from the track, and Mercedes-Benz left racing for about two decades.

AMA’s Attempted Bans

At a board meeting of the Automobile Manufacturers Association (AMA) in 1957, the president of General Motors, Harlow Curtice, floated the idea that the association ban factory-supported racing in hopes that it would keep the government from imposing racing regulations on the automobile industry. On June 6, 1957, the AMA adopted a resolution and banned race involvement, meaning that manufacturers not only would not support organized racing with new cars but also would stop supplying race cars and doing anything to publicize results or use performance as a selling tool for their new vehicles.

In reality, Ford was the only manufacturer that abided by the ban, as General Motors and Chrysler paid it lip service but continued to build hot cars for the street. Ford quickly noticed the burgeoning market full of younger speed-obsessed new-car buyers. Like-minded people inside Ford eventually got through to the bean counters pulling the strings and, by 1960, began to market to younger performance-minded and style-conscious people who were buying new cars.

Factory 1960s Hot Rods from Ford

Ford introduced the all-new Ford-Edsel (FE) series in 1958, which was initially a 332-ci engine with a 352 variant that offered up to 300 hp. In 1960, when Ford debuted the sleek Starliner (an upscale Galaxie with a bubble top roofline), the marque trailed the lighter and smaller Chevrolets and Pontiacs but stepped up to the plate with the midyear introduction of the 360-hp 352.

In a memo dated July 11, 1960, Economy and Performance Division manager Dave Evans approved a lease of a 360-hp Starliner that came to be known as the Black Project. The AMA ban was still technically in place, but the Black Project allowed Ford to look into the racing potential of the new car and yet not break any rules imposed by the ban. A few of those cars competed in some 1960 NHRA National events and, while they didn’t win, they held their own against many of the Chevys.

This was around the same time that Gaspar Gas Ronda was racing a 360-hp 352 Starliner and regularly beating up on Chevys at Half Moon Bay Raceway in Northern California. He soon hooked up with Les Ritchey, a high-performance automotive shop owner who had set a ton of records in a Y-block-equipped 1956 Ford. Ford’s post-AMA ban effort now was taking flight. Through the pages of Hot Rod, folks outside California saw what was going on and tried to either duplicate what the West Coast was doing or do it better, with many choosing 1960 Fords as their platform.

For 1961, the FE was given more cubic inches with a bigger bore and stroke (4.05- and 3.78-inch, respectively) for 390 ci of displacement and 300 hp with a 4-barrel. Soon a performance version became available, offering 375 hp with a 4-barrel on an aluminum intake manifold or 401 horses with a triple 2-barrel induction setup. The magazines began paying attention. Car Craft called the 390/401 Detroit’s Hottest Street Engine on its October 1961 cover. They somewhat had to, since Fords were beginning to win in the Stock classes at the drag strip.

Dick Brannan was making a name for himself at the track with his 1960 Galaxie Starliner, racking up a gang of trophies. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Here are Bob Martin and Jerry Alderman racing their 401-hp 390 Starliner in Super Stock in 1961. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Dick Brannan raced his street-driven Starliner in Super Stock at NHRA’s 1961 Indianapolis event. While he didn’t win, he was successful, eventually moving on to become Ford’s Drag Coordinator. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Dick Brannan’s 1962 lightweight Galaxie was located and restored to its original-as-raced appearance. This is one of only three of the original 11 lightweight Galaxies known to exist. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

In 1962, Ford again bumped up the power of the FE by creating the 406, a bored version of the 390 with 385 or 405 hp (with single 4-barrel or three 2-barrels, respectively). Advertising in turn was getting more aggressive, blatantly advertising the performance of Ford vehicles.

Around that time, veteran Dick Brannan was working as the pilot for Romy-Hammes Ford’s company airplane. He happened to become friendly with the son of the owner of the South Bend, Indiana, dealership and, through that relationship, he convinced the dealership to buy a 406 Galaxie and go racing. The duo plus a mechanic promptly took over a service bay to prep the Galaxie for NHRA’s Super Stock class at Detroit Dragway.

The Fermier Brothers, out of Jacksonville, Florida, usually won whichever race they entered with this 1962 406 Galaxie. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

As mentioned in CarTech’s book Total Performers: Ford Drag Racing in the 1960s, author Charles R. Morris wrote, Entered in the Super Stock event, Dick proceeded to not only mow down every Chevrolet, Pontiac, and Mopar in sight, but also to knock off the ‘factory’ Fords of team test drivers Bill Humphries and Len Richter. Having won the event, Dick would not be declared the winner until the car was found to be legal, as some believed there was no way that this kid and his Ford won fair and square. After practically dismantling the entire car, track officials declared it legal in the wee hours of the morning. The crowd, having remained to see the outcome of the tear-down, cheered the underdog who had beaten the big boys.

Even Ford brass wasn’t convinced that Brannan and his Galaxie were legitimate, so he was invited to bring it to Ford’s Romeo, Michigan, test track to prove it (which was foreshadowing a very significant moment in the birth of the 428 Cobra Jet—but more on that later). After Brannan yet again whipped up on Ford factory race cars and drivers, Ford offered Brannan the job of Drag Racing Coordinator in the Experimental Vehicles Department, which was the beginning of a successful relationship between Brannan and Ford that would eventually be called the Ford Drag Council.

Here the Fermier Brothers’ 1962 406 Galaxie lays waste to the Jackshaw 1966 Pontiac GTO. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Ford Racers

Other Ford racers of note were Phil Bonner, Chuck Martin, and Leon Burt; all raced in both NHRA’s Stock classes and purpose-built non-NHRA-legal cars to make money in the hotly contested match racing world of the Southeast. During this time, Chevrolet developed a reputation with the 409 engine, which helped prompt the arrival on the scene of a man who would be pivotal in not only Ford drag performance and racing but also the saga of the 428 Cobra Jet: Robert E. Tasca of Tasca Ford in East Providence, Rhode Island.

Tasca had almost had enough of the punk kid driving by his dealership in a 1962 409 Chevy, talking smack about Fords, and leaving in a haze of tire smoke. The dealer instructed his chief mechanic, John Healey, to find out who this kid was (Billy Lawton) and then build a Ford to kick his butt. The weapon of choice became the first of a series of Tasca race cars: a 1962 Ford with a stout 406 engine. Tasca met Lawton at the local drag strip and informed him, Kid, you just won your last drag race. Healey won the race handily, but Tasca was impressed by Lawton’s skill behind the wheel and hired him to drive his future race cars.

In the middle of the 1963 model year, the soon-to-be-legendary 427 debuted. It was a remodel of the 406 with the same 3.78 stroke but a bigger bore of 4.23 inches, plus a more robust bottom-end design. With a single 4-barrel carb, the 427 made 410 hp or 425 with dual Holley 4-barrels, both on an aluminum low-riser, dual-plane intake. Introduced at the same time as the 427 was a sleek semi-fastback roofline, both in time for the 1963 Daytona 500.

This document is unique because it is an early example of a manufacturer recognizing the role marketing played in selling high-performance cars. No number of race victories would have translated into 427 sales without a knowledgeable sales force.

At this moment, it was fairly apparent that Ford was all but divorced from the AMA ban on racing, especially after 1963’s Total Performance assault on global competition. That year saw the creation of several lightweight, purpose-built Galaxies with the R-code 427 and as little clutter as possible, all in the name of speed—things like sound deadener, carpet, radio, heater, and similar creature comforts were left in the parts bins. Drag Council drivers Gas Ronda and Les Ritchey fielded a two-car team running in Factory Experimental (FX) as the brain trust at Ford put a lot of effort building special race cars for other Drag Council members.

Bob Tasca, always with a pulse on what buyers wanted, made a point in a meeting at Ford that it wasn’t fair that the limited number of lightweight Galaxies should only be available to racers, since a buyer who saw one win on Sunday and bought one on Monday (Tasca has been given credit with the Win on Sunday, sell on Monday quotation) would be disappointed that his new Galaxie was obviously nowhere near as fast as the car he just watched at the races. When the question came up about who would sell them if Ford were to build more lightweight Galaxies, Tasca stepped up to the plate and ordered 18 of them for his dealership. As for the racing end of it, Gas Ronda ran a 12.07 elapsed time in Super Stock at the 1963 Winternationals with a lightweight Galaxie (which should have given him the win because the Z11 Chevy that defeated him was deemed illegal after the race), while Dick Brannan set 22 track records and won more than 65 races during the 1963 season.

Along Comes the Thunderbolt

Which brings us back to Bob Tasca. In 1963, he once again showed Ford how a fast car could be built with existing production pieces when he put a 427 V-8 under the hood of the intermediate-sized Fairlane and convinced Ford to build a prototype. A 1963 Fairlane was sent to Dearborn Steel Tubing and modified into a race car with Tasca’s input. This vehicle featured a domed fiberglass hood to clear the high-riser setup (later cars featured a teardrop hood), front bumper and fenders, and lightweight plexiglass windows.

After Ford evaluated the Fairlane, it was given a go, and Domestic Special Order #33A was established. This, along with paperwork outlining that the cars would go on sale in November 1963 and be covered under Ford’s factory warranty, lent some legitimacy to the factory race car ruse in order to gain NHRA approval.

Ultimately, the prototype lost its 1963 NHRA Nationals debut when driver Bill Humphrey missed a shift during eliminations; later, with Lawton driving, the Tasca Fairlane set the NHRA A/Factory Experimental MPH record. On the other side of the street performance coin, the economical Falcon received a hot thin-wall 260-ci small-block in the Sprint model, complete with sleeker roofline, à la Galaxie 500.

A mighty launch from Jack Whitby’s Total Performer Thunderbolt of Wilmington, Delaware. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Dick Brannan posing with the first Thunderbolt, The Lively One, in this promotional photo. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

With the success of the Tasca Fairlane under its belt, Ford decided to unleash 50 competition versions for NHRA Super Stock, now using a 289-powered 1964 Fairlane 500 two-door sedan as the base and having Dearborn Steel Tubing build them. The Super Stock 427 Fairlane was available via Thunderbolt, special order through the office of the Special Vehicles Manager and would be delivered to the dealer it was ordered from only after the buyer signed what was basically a release of liability and a promise not to register it for the street. The 427 high-riser was making about 500 hp and, off the trailer, Thunderbolts were running low 12s/high 11s in the quarter mile. With tuning and some experience, consistent mid-11s quickly became the norm.

Sure enough, the Thunderbolt scored a win at the 1964 Winternationals when Gas Ronda beat Butch Leal in Mickey Thompson’s eventually going on to win the class championship that year. Dick Brannan, Len Richter, Phil Bonner, Bill Lawton, and many more T-bolt drivers dispatched the competition throughout 1964, solidifying Ford as a serious player in the horsepower wars.

A look at the Roy Hammes/Dick Brannan 1964 AF/X Falcon, the first of two built by Dearborn Steel Tubing. It was used as a testbed or mule to develop parts for the AF/X Mustang for the following year. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Al Joniec posing with his Batcar AF/X Mustang in 1966. The car was formerly called Pegasus but, due to the popularity of the Batman TV show, Joniec changed his marketing plan and reinvented the car. It initially was powered by a 427 high-riser, but Ford soon hooked Joniec up with a SOHC 427 Cammer running gasoline, which he eventually modded with mechanical fuel injection stacks running nitromethane. He also switched to an automatic transmission and eventually extended the wheelbase in true AF/X style. (Photo Courtesy Charlie Morris)

Altered Mustangs

By the time 1965 rolled around (or, more specifically, April 17, 1964), the Mustang was unveiled not just to fanfare but also to insane sales numbers as the car exploded off of magazine pages, television screens, and out of Ford showrooms. The new pony car (as it came to be known) was small, sporty, and reasonably quick for its market position.

When racers saw the little Mustang, they instantly were overcome with an inclination to stuff that big 427 under the hood … and the first A/FX Mustangs were born. A/FX cars were basically the forefathers of today’s nitro Funny Car, meaning they were race cars with barely a hint of streetability. One of the first successful A/FX Mustangs was owned by Hawkinson Ford and driven by Ron Pellegrini, who had talked Ford out of a new Mustang and then parted out a successful-but-bygone Thunderbolt for its go-fast parts for the Mustang. The car ran 10-second ETs, and Pellegrini won the A/FX class at every race he entered, as well as the title of Overall Stock Eliminator at the US 30 Dragway Meet of Champions on Labor Day Weekend 1964.

The 289-ci Mustangs were also populating Stock classes and doing quite well. Ford performance was solidified in the minds